Actually, the statistics show that glider flying is much safer than flying light (powered) aircraft.

Gliders are designed to fly without engines and pilots are trained to operate them safely. They normally only fly in good weather. Gliders have a very flat glide angle so from any given height the pilot has lots of choice to select a safe landing area. Even when things go wrong and an accident occurs, the pilot often survives as gliders only fly relatively slowly.

In contrast, when a light aircraft accident occurs through failure of the engine, pilot error or other mishap, the pilot has a much smaller margin for choosing the crash site, and the crash will be at a higher speed. The occupant(s) is/are surrounded by dangerous hot machinery and toxic highly inflamable fuel.

The fact that many light aircraft accidents (and subsequent fatalities) are due to engine failure shows why gliders are so safe: if there isn't an engine, then it can't go wrong!

Thanks, cep! I'm leaning toward going forward with gliding, and I have thought about the RC angle. It would be much less expensive to do RC and I would have more opportunity to actually do it (and less planning ahead). But it isn't nearly as thrilling. I'm still of two minds about it, as you can tell.

Keep the glider wings parallel to the wings of the tug (so if the tug is level, keep your wings level, and if it banked say ten degrees, then keep the glider banked ten degrees also). If you do this, then even if the glider is out to the one side, the tension in the rope will tend to pull you back in line.

You still have to worry about keeping at the right height relative to the tug - the trick here is to only change height slowly - especially if you have to move down relative to the tug - if you lose height too quickly, then the tow rope goes slack, and that is not a good situation.

Only you can decide whether it's worth the cost of continuing. For most people, learning is the best bit. Once you have gone solo and done your first few soaring flights, then it can become a bit for some.

I never regretted the money I spent on gliding.

If you decide not to continue you can get back to model flying - this is harder than flying full size, though of course the consequences of getting things wrong are much less.

We normally only tow up to 2000ft in the UK (thermals here are usually smaller but closer together than in the USA - also cloud base is probably lower, on average).

The pawnee is a powerful tug. I was normally towed by a Super Cub, though I was once towed up by a Tiger Moth (old low-power biplane); I was flying a K8 glider that time - the Tiger Moth pilot was a keen sailplane pilot himself and at 1000ft waved me off (signalled for me to disconnect from the tow) as he knew we were flying through good lift.

You'll love it once the weather improves enough for you to do a few more flights - then you'll start doing most of the flying yourself - first while you're up high, then the take-off and aerotow and soon after that, the landings!

I used to do a lot of glider flying. I got my silver C and Gold Height, and I was able to take passengers up for their first ride/lesson, though I never became a full instructor. I'm not current right now, but I might take it up again if I ever get enough free time.

I recommend you read Gliding by Derek Piggott. It might be a bit out of date now, and of course it covers gliding as carried out in Britain, but it is well written and has tons of useful information. I would recommend any of Piggott's books, but Gliding is the classic.

I'm with Curses, as long as you don't get stuck in it forever, I'm sure in the future you will be wishing you were calm and content instead of being drafted as a fighter pilot to destroy giant alien spaceships that just leveled all the major cities.